And after James Webb, what?

En 1982 los científicos dijeron necesitamos un gran telescopio en el espacio para no tener que depender de la noche y liberarnos de la atmósfera y su turbulencia para observar el espacio con Claridad. Una década después el telescopio espacial Hubble estaba en órbita, en 1991 los científicos dijeron necesitamos un gran telescopio en el espacio, pero más grande que el Hubble para más resolución, pero que pueda ver en luz infrarroja para poder observar más atrás en el tiempo a los orígenes del universo. Dos décadas más tarde el telescopio espacial James Webb era lanzado al espacio, lo que significa que ya deberíamos estar planeando el siguiente gran telescopio espacial como en este momento, si no queremos esperar más de dos décadas para tenerlo en órbita.

The James web space telescope launched at Christmas last year in its first months of operation has taken all our wigs, it has shown us that it is not only an expensive toy, it is actually worth what it cost, the images it gives us are spectacular and the amount of science it is producing is incredible. But with the Hubble Space Telescope nearing the end of its useful life, its successor is already being thought about and the next visible-light space telescope will have to be a huge leap in capabilities and of course in size, because if anywhere is true The expression of "size does matter" is precisely speaking of telescopes.

Telescopes are literally “buckets” of light, just as a bucket can capture raindrops, a telescope does precisely the same, but with photons, that is, light, and the bigger the “bucket”, in this case, the more light the telescope will collect, which can translate into image sharpness and clarity, especially on objects that are too dim like nebulae or very distant galaxies. The bigger the mirror of a telescope the better, a commercial telescope that has a 20 cm diameter mirror gets very good images, but even if your optics were perfect, which they are not, there is a physical limit to the amount of detail. or resolution it can display, if you want more resolution you will need a larger telescope.

Keep in mind that the equipment Hubble runs on is decades old, its newest camera was installed during its fourth and final servicing mission in 2009, just remember the photos you took with your 2009 phone. A new visible-light telescope with current technology would be incredibly capable than Hubble, especially if its "bucket" of light is larger. When Hubble launched, its mirror size was limited by the vehicle that launched it into orbit. , the space shuttle. Anything bigger than the shuttle's cargo bay couldn't be taken into orbit, so during the development of the James Webb Space Telescope, the way that would allow us to fit a huge telescope into a 18-foot-diameter rocket, the secret was make it foldable.

James webb does not have a monolithic mirror like hubble or a single piece of glass instead it has 18 hexagonal segments that allow it to fold in three to fit in a conventional rocket, it was not easy this was one of the reasons why Because the James Webb took so long to be built and put into orbit, new technologies had to be invented for its construction, with all the delays and budget increases that this brings. The good thing is that now we know how to do it and more importantly we know that it works, so we can plan and build a bigger and more ambitious telescope in much less time.

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